Eagles thump Christian, roll into district title game

SoBoCo football seniors have led the Eagles to a 9-2 record – the most wins ever in a season by an Eagles team. From left: Kolton Schupp, Spencer Taggart, Bo Varvil, Cole Morris, Brian Kent, Colin Vaughan, Tanner Smith, Zane Safley, Clay Jeffrey, Dalton Mann, Colton Lowrey, Ben Grabner and Nick Graddy. SoBoCo plays Blair Oaks on Friday for the district championship.

SoBoCo’s ‘bend-but-don’t-break defense got a pair of key third quarter stops and the offense used a bruising ground game to defeat the Christian Eagles 56-35 on Friday night in Ashland.

The win was the ninth this season – setting a record for the school at 9-2 – and propels SoBoCo into the district championship game at Blair Oaks on Friday. Kickoff is at 7 pm in Wardsville.

While the Eagles were stopped just before halftime at the Christian goal line, leaving the two teams deadlocked at 21-21, coach Trent Tracy knew the third quarter would be a key for his team.

“We came out and our defense forced a punt and we went down and scored. Then we exchanged fumbles and we stopped them again and scored.”

Up by two touchdowns, the Eagles began to breathe a little more easily.

Utilizing a punishing ground game which rolled up 393 yards rushing, SoBoCo began to limit the Christian offense by keeping them off the field.

Jackson Sartain led the Eagles with eight carries for 140 yards and a touchdown and Tanner Smith had 10 carries for 28 yards and three TDs.

The back-and-forth game saw the teams exchange touchdowns in first half, with Christian passing the ball quickly downfield – but nearly always playing from behind.

Christian had 376 yards passing on 51 attempts, could never take the lead on SoBoCo.

“It was back-and-forth and we lost a pair of fumbles, but out defense stopped them when we needed to,” Tracy said.